


Identity

by ghee (sabakunoghee)



Series: Arthur Fleck; the clown [4]
Category: Joker (2019)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-21
Updated: 2019-10-21
Packaged: 2020-12-27 14:16:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21120161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabakunoghee/pseuds/ghee
Summary: Thus, a cold-blooded murderer was born.





	Identity

**Author's Note:**

> Un-betaed. Another character study based on this scene. Picture from a random search on google.

* * *

His pathological laughing always put him either to shame or into trouble.

It wasn’t different when he took a train home that night – when Arthur Fleck failed to control his anxiety, his neurological disease stroke, forced him to spontaneously laugh. And it was considered inappropriate, unacceptable by the source of the problem, three young businessmen who verbally harassed a defenseless woman. The clown was already having a bad day when the misunderstanding developed into a worse conflict. Physical assault was inevitable, and Arthur was never _designed_ to fight back. He curled and cried and begged but the kicks and punches didn’t stop torturing him. He had enough. _More_ than just _enough_.

The first shot was a pure accident. He just wanted to protect himself. The second one was a reflex. He had to get rid of him before he got to the police station. The last was – _intentional_. When he pulled the trigger, unlike his first and second, Arthur was confident and fully in control. His grip was steady, his objective was clear, his expression was serene. The was nothing more terrifying than a mentally impaired individual with a loaded gun, and Gotham learned it the hardest way possible. Arthur was immoderately calm, he lowered the weapon and heartlessly stared at the corpse before him. Thus, a cold-blooded murderer was born.

_Wasn’t it fun?_

_How do you feel, Art, for exterminating garbage from this sick, hypocrite society?_

“What have I done?”

He finished the hunting. He completed what he started. And here he was, as soon as he realized the sin he committed, Arthur locked himself in an empty bathroom. His hands rested on the door. As he tried to think rationally; his face was hidden beneath the clown make-up, he could quickly dispose of the gun, if he reached his apartment fast enough, perhaps the police wouldn’t suspect him. Arthur _knew_ and he was able to _analyze_ his next move, however, his body rejected to execute the escape plan. He was completely absorbed by the second voice from his deepest, twisted mind – and instead of running away, he _danced_.

(His feet, long and thin, silently stepped, _one, two, three_.)

(His hands, gently, gracefully, performed a salute, swiveling around.)

Arthur had always lived in two different worlds that coexisted one and another. Once he stepped out from the first one – the _real_ timeline where norms and regulation strangled his neck, he swiftly switched to the second – his _personal_ manifestation of utopia. In his imaginary realm, Arthur fleck was the center of any term of attention. Tonight, his performance was a massive success, prosecuted on a bloody platform.

Unfortunately, the show he presented wasn’t as glimmering as Arthur had always imagined. He wished to be basked in colors of spotlight _(a dimmed lamp above his head blinked irregularly)_, to be welcomed on a sophisticated stage _(the broken, dirty sink smelled like rust and vomit)_, to be drowned in the rain of applause _(the only sound he could hear was an ear-hurting silence)._ Arthur wanted nothing more than an audience, but no one would love to listen to him, to see him – _oh_, he found one. There he was! His one and only, the loyal supporter who would never abandon him, as he saw his own reflection in the mirror.

Arthur smiled and _he_ smiled back at him,

The sunken face, the untidy hair, the smeared lipstick. As much as he wanted to believe that he was worthy, Arthur was left alone with a brutal fact that he was unwanted. Lonely. Withdrawn.

“Recognize me.”

In the end, no one would stand for him. He grasped the idea that it was impossible for him to be happy.

The strobe light flickered in flashing green, illuminated his exhausted face, emphasized his unique, strong facial complexion. Arthur Fleck had always been aimless, but never he faced a dead-end. For him, who’d always been running, to be trapped was both blessing and suffering. He found bizarre comfort in the solid darkness. He felt safe. It was the most enigmatic sensation that could ever happen to him – hence, he knew, he fathomed that he was different, that he was an anomaly, _but he couldn’t be anything but an oddity._

Arthur was suffering, constantly, every second; he obediently attended therapy, he religiously took the medication, yet for him, the asylum was more comfortable than reality. His disease didn’t let him breathe without suffocating, to taste delicious meal without the urge to vomit, to sway his flexible body without the need to smash his head on the wall. He _wanted_ to be normal; but what is _normal_, he wondered.

How could he describe shapes and colors to a person who was born blind? How to properly explain the beauty of melodies and rhythms to those who naturally couldn’t hear? He, _too,_ was sick, but why the system treated him _differently,_ why he had to be _discriminated_ – not only he had to endure the torturing voices inside his head, Arthur was also suffering from judgment, isolation, and persecution. _Unfair._

Nevertheless, he was just a mere, insignificant grain of sand in an endless desert – and this tiny particle was blown away by a strong gush of wind, slow-dancing, following the harmony which was never real.

_The curtain was closing on him,_

Arthur embraced his new identity as a killer.


End file.
